With the impending arrival of a consignment of Pfizer COVID-19 vaccines, which are approved for children age 12 and older, the government has started seeking the consent of parents to administer vaccines to eligible children in the public school system.
Minister of Health Dr Frank Anthony yesterday confirmed that the Minis-try of Education (MoE) has begun sending out letters seeking parental consent.
“…to ensure our school-age population is protected from the coronavirus, the Ministry of Education in collaboration with the Ministry of Health will be making this vaccine available to all students 12 years and older from the 31st August 2021 as we work towards the possible reopening of schools,” a copy of the letter, which was obtained by Stabroek News, states.
During his COVID-19 update yesterday, Anthony announced that the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education have agreed to collaborate to ensure that school children can have access to COVID-19 vaccines.
He acknowledged the need for parental consent to enable the children to be vaccinated. “The [parents] have to sign those letters and send them back with the child and so we will know whether or not we can vaccinate the child. That’s a very important component of the programme because persons under 18 cannot decide for themselves if they want to be vaccinated and their parents will have to give consent,” Anthony stated.
Once the letters are returned, the ministry will be able to plan a more detailed execution of the vaccination campaign for children.
The Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are the only COVID-19 vaccines that have been given emergency approval for children who are 12 years and older.
On Thursday, Anthony had said that the government had been making efforts to procure the two vaccines and that it is expected that these will become available in Guyana very soon. He confirmed yesterday that 100,000 Pfizer doses are due to arrive next month.
According to Anthony, the Pfizer vaccine requires special storage as it needs to be kept at a -70 degrees temperature. The freezers that will maintain this temperature have already been bought. The thawing process is also a bit more time-consuming as the vaccine temperature has to gradually be lowered until it can be used to inoculate a patient. In addition, he said, once the temperature is reduced, it cannot be placed back into the freezer, which is why the campaign for the administering of the vaccine requires more intense planning.
In addition, Anthony said the ministry has already started training staff on how to store the vaccine, which comes with its own special syringes. Training on the usage of the syringes should commence soon.
To date, 3,815 persons under the age of 18 have been infected with COVID-19. Anthony said most of these cases were mild and did not require hospitalisation but this can easily change with the Delta variant circulating globally.
According to Anthony, as of yesterday, 282,586 Guyanese adults had been inoculated with the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and this accounts for 58% of the adult population. Of that number, 146,500 persons or 30.1% of the adult population have received a second dose.
“I want to appeal to person to get vaccinated. We have enough vaccines for the adult population so there is no excuse why we shouldn’t get,” Anthony stated.
